Category Archives: Middle East and North Africa

Terrified families flee Rafah as Israel set to open all-out assault

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Leaflet instructs Palestinians to leave southern Gaza city as Benjamin Netanyahu shuns pressure from Joe Biden

More than a hundred thousand Palestinians fled Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city, on Saturday, after Israeli warnings to evacuate before an imminent military assault that will open a bloody new phase of the seven-month-long conflict.

Roads leading out of Rafah were choked with long columns of young and old, sick and healthy, riding in overloaded pick-up trucks and battered cars, in pony carts and on hand-pulled trolleys. Many walked, carrying their belongings, under a searing summer sun. Some were pushed in wheelchairs or even carried.

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Latest Gaza evacuation warnings expose weak spots in Israel’s war strategy

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Awareness of diplomatic fallout has led Israel to downplay offensive, while return to north shows difficulty of eliminating Hamas

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Two elements are particularly striking about the latest evacuation warnings issued by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to residents and displaced people in central Rafah and a considerable part of northern Gaza.

The first is that the warnings for Rafah were put at the bottom of leaflets and social media posts, almost as if the IDF was trying to downplay the coming offensive. This may be because Israeli military officials have told the media for much of the week that they were carrying out “precise, limited and targeted” operations in the city with the sole objective of seizing the key border crossing with Egypt. This is now clearly not the case, if it ever was.

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Israel-Gaza war live: IDF orders evacuation of central Rafah as it prepares to expand offensive – as it happened

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Israeli military drops leaflets ordering hundreds of thousands of people to leave the city. This blog is now closed.

In case you missed it yesterday, the UN general assembly voted overwhelmingly to back the Palestinian bid for full UN membership.

Israeli tanks have reached the Salahuddin Road which crosses Rafah, dividing its centre from the eastern neighbourhoods evacuated before Israel’s seizure of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt last week, witnesses in Rafah told the Guardian.

Our neighbours and friends have been looking for a place for a while in case something happened but since the leaflets were dropped this morning, they are afraid and anxious.

They have already begun to dismantle their tents and prepare their belongings for transportation.

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Israel orders central Rafah residents to evacuate as major offensive looms

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Hundreds of thousands more people face displacement as military instructions suggest likely attack on centre of city

The Israeli military has told residents of central Rafah to evacuate, signalling a major expansion of its military operations in the city and threatening the displacement of hundreds of thousands more people.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) seized the Rafah border crossing with Egypt last week in what it said was a “precise, targeted operation” after ordering the evacuation of eastern neighbourhoods. More than 150,000 people have already fled the southern city in Gaza.

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Eurovision struggles to keep politics out as Israel controversy hits Malmö

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Competing rallies are on the streets, Netherlands’ entrant is under investigation and others complain music is being overshadowed

The official motto of the 68th edition of Eurovision is “united by music”, but as the continent’s beglittered and sequined masses descended on the Swedish city of Malmö for Saturday’s grand final, music’s ability to heal and bridge divides was looking in serious doubt.

In the run-up to the song contest’s main event, the Netherlands’ performer Joost Klein missed his slot in two dress rehearsals after being put under investigation by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) due to an unexplained “incident”.

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UN general assembly votes to back Palestinian bid for membership

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Assembly votes 143 to nine, with 25 abstentions, signalling Israel’s growing isolation on the world stage

The UN general assembly has voted overwhelmingly to back the Palestinian bid for full UN membership, in a move that signalled Israel’s growing global isolation amid alarm over the war in Gaza and the extent of the humanitarian crisis in the territory.

The assembly voted by 143 to nine, with 25 abstentions, for a resolution that called on the UN security council to bestow full membership to the state of Palestine, while enhancing its current mission with a range of new rights and privileges, in addition to what it is allowed in its current observer status.

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Number of Palestinians fleeing Rafah rises above 150,000 amid Israeli strikes

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People who have already been repeatedly displaced by war describe their plight as they seek safety elsewhere in Gaza

Under a blazing summer sun, tens of thousands of Palestinians fled Israeli bombardment and clashes with Hamas militants in Rafah on Friday, choking roads with donkey carts, bicycles, pickup trucks and wheelchairs.

More than 150,000 people have now left Gaza’s southernmost city since receiving warnings on Monday from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) of an imminent military operation, with most moving after airstrikes and fighting intensified later in the week.

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Israel-Gaza war: UN passed resolution for security council to reconsider and support Palestine membership – as it happened

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This live blog is now closed. For the latest news on this UN vote, you can read our full report:

On a visit to Washington, German defence minister Boris Pistorius expressed “understanding” for the US threat to limit arms supplies to Israel in the event of a full-blown Rafah offensive but stopped short of setting any new red lines on German weapons.

However, he told ZDF public television that Germany must put pressure on Israel “not to go too far” and to “slow down” in its military response to the 7 October attacks. “

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Israel’s isolation grows over war in Gaza and rise in settler violence

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Actions of Netanyahu’s government have sparked international anger and made a long-threatened ‘diplomatic tsunami’ real

Israel is facing a long-threatened “diplomatic tsunami” on multiple fronts over its handling of the war in Gaza and the unprecedented rise in violent settler attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank.

Amid almost monthly sanctions announcements from the US and European capitals over settler violence, which have incrementally expanded their scope, the Guardian understands yet more potential targets are under consideration.

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Australia’s support for UN resolution on Palestinian membership ‘not recognition of statehood’

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Penny Wong reiterates support for eventual two-state solution after watered-down resolution passed by general assembly

Australia’s support of a UN vote on Palestinian membership is “the opposite of what Hamas wants”, and is not about recognising Palestine as a state, according to the foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong.

The draft resolution was significantly watered down in last-minute negotiations and Australia was among 143 UN general assembly members to pass the resolution calling on the security council to reconsider granting full membership to Palestine.

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Coldplay and Sting call for release of Toomaj Salehi, Iranian rapper sentenced to death

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Leading cultural figures including Margaret Atwood sign statement in support of rapper who criticised Iranian regime

More than 100 figures from the worlds of music, culture and human rights activism – including Coldplay and Sting – have signed a statement calling for the release of the Iranian rapper Toomaj Salehi who has been sentenced to death in Iran after protesting in support of women’s rights.

The 33-year-old, who was a vocal supporter of the Women, Life, Freedom movement in Iran was sentenced to death by a court in the city of Isfahan on 24 April, according to his lawyer.

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UN agency closes East Jerusalem HQ after arson attack by ‘Israeli extremists’

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Unrwa chief says compound has faced a number of attacks, with lives of UN staff at serious risk

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees has temporarily closed its East Jerusalem headquarters after weeks of attacks.

“This evening, Israeli residents set fire twice to the perimeter of the Unrwa headquarters in occupied East Jerusalem,” the head of the agency, Philippe Lazzarini, tweeted, lamenting that it was the second attack on the compound within days.

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‘We will fight with our fingernails’ says Netanyahu after US threat to curb arms

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Israeli prime minister says country can ‘stand alone’ but later says he hopes US and Israel can overcome differences

Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed that Israel will stand alone and “fight with our fingernails” in defiance of US threats to further restrict arms deliveries if Israeli forces proceed with an offensive on the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, was speaking on Thursday after Israeli and Hamas delegations left the ceasefire negotiations in Cairo. It was unclear whether the talks had broken down or simply paused. Hamas said early on Friday that the “ball is now completely” in Israel’s hands, while Israel has claimed that Hamas’s version of a deal fell far short of its requirements.

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More than 100,000 flee Rafah as Israel steps up strikes, says UN

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Deep concern displaced people will return to rubble of former homes without ‘basic essentials necessary for life’

More than 100,000 people have fled Rafah after Israel intensified its bombardment, UN officials have said, in the largest movement of population in Gaza for many months.

Humanitarian officials are tracking the number of people fleeing Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, where more than 1 million people displaced from elsewhere in the territory have been sheltering.

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Does Israel need more US arms for a Rafah offensive?

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Biden’s threat to halt shipments seems to leave some weapon types available to Israel as well as stockpiles and an unaffected air force

The volume of US military aid to Israel since 7 October last year suggests the intensity of the assault on Gaza would not have been possible without the continued supply of American bombs, shells and other munitions, some of which the US president, Joe Biden, is now threatening to halt after seven months of the fighting.

Precise figures are hard to come by, partly because the US is careful to keep shipments below disclosable limits and can rely on old congressional approvals, sometimes dating back many years, to send arms without the need for fresh authorisation. But even the limited disclosure reveals their significance.

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David Cameron says UK will not withhold arms sales to Israel

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Foreign secretary says British weapons position different to US, but UK does not support Rafah invasion without civilian protection plan

David Cameron has said the UK will not be withholding arms sales to Israel, saying its position is not comparable with that of the US, which has paused the delivery of a weapons shipment, since the UK is not a large state-to-state arms supplier to Israel.

The foreign secretary added that the UK did not support a large-scale invasion of Rafah unless it saw a plan that protects civilians, a position the UK has repeated for the past month.

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Children ‘piled up and shot’: new details emerge of ethnic cleansing in Darfur

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As El Fasher stands on the ‘precipice of a massacre’, rights groups call for sanctions after new testimony describes atrocities carried out by RSF paramilitaries in Sudan

Gruesome new testimony details one of the worst atrocities of the year-long Sudanese civil war – the large-scale massacre of civilians as they desperately tried to flee an ethnic rampage in Darfur last summer.

Witnesses describe children, still alive, being “piled up and shot” by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) as they attempted to escape the regional capital of El Geneina in June last year during a bout of ethnic violence in which thousands of civilians were killed.

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US will stop supplying some weapons to Israel if it invades Rafah, Biden warns

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US president publicly warns that his administration will not provide the weapons for an offensive on Rafah

Joe Biden has issued a blunt warning to Israel that his administration will stop supplying bombs and artillery shells if its military pushes ahead with an offensive on the southern Gaza city of Rafah, in what could mark the start of a turning point in relations between the two countries.

The US president delivered the warning in a television interview in which he brushed aside Israeli and Republican complaints and made clear his administration would not provide the weapons for an offensive on Rafah, which the US, the UN and other aid agencies warn would trigger a humanitarian disaster.

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Trinity College Dublin agrees to divest from Israeli firms after student protest

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Five-day encampment in university grounds that caused the college major loss of income ended in victory for campaigners

Students at Trinity College Dublin have ended a five-day encampment after the university pledged to cut ties with Israeli companies.

Student leaders claimed victory on Wednesday night for a US-style campaign that had disrupted the campus and blocked access to the Book of Kells.

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Biden seeks to pull rank in US-Israel relationship – a trial of strength beckons

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The decision to place a weapons shipment on hold sends a message to Netanyahu that the US dog is beginning to regain control of its tail

In placing a hold on a shipment of US-made bombs to Israel, and warning there could be more restrictions to come, Joe Biden is sending a message to Benjamin Netanyahu that his administration is no longer prepared to be a dog wagged by its own tail.

Netanyahu’s repeated defiance of US warnings not to pursue an offensive on Rafah had been based on an assumption that curbing the US weapons supply could inflict more political damage on Biden than on the Israeli prime minister, and that Netanyahu could cause havoc for the president at home at the height of an election year.

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